From Newsgroup: rec.arts.drwho.moderated   
   From Address: jphalt@aol.com   
   Subject: Re: jphalt's Doctor Who reviews   
      
   THE GIRL WHO WAITED   
      
   1 episode. Approx. 45 minutes. Written by: Tom MacRae. Directed by:   
   Nick Hurran. Produced by: Marcus Wilson.   
      
      
   THE PLOT   
      
   The Doctor brings Amy and Rory to the planet Apalapucia, a pleasure   
   planet where he promises a fantastic holiday. But a delayed Amy   
   becomes separated from the Doctor and Rory. It becomes apparent that   
   she's caught in a separate time stream. Hours, days, even weeks are   
   passing for her while only minutes go by for her friends. That's when   
   they learn that the planet suffered a plague whose victims will die   
   within a day. Out of desperation, the people of Apalapucia used their   
   technology to stretch that day so that it would last for a lifetime.   
      
   The Doctor quickly puts together a lash-up to find Amy, and brings the   
   TARDIS into her time-stream. He can't go himself, as Time Lords are   
   susceptibe to this disease but humans are not. So he sends Rory to   
   find and recover her. But the Doctor, who has kept Amy waiting so many   
   times in the past, has gotten the times wrong again. Decades have   
   passed within this time-stream. Instead of his lovely bride, Rory   
   finds an aging, bitter Amy, filled with hatred at the Doctor for   
   ruining her life!   
      
      
   CHARACTERS   
      
   The Doctor: The teaser provides a pretty good summation of the   
   Doctor's character, this Doctor even more than previous incarnations.   
   The TARDIS materializes in a featureless room with a single door. Amy   
   wants to take a moment to get something from the TARDIS. All the   
   Doctor has to do to avoid the crisis is wait for one or two minutes.   
   But there's a door in front of him. Of course he's going to go through   
   it, and of course he's not going to wait. The last part of the episode   
   sums up the other part of his character, the darker part. This is a   
   man who's become a warrior, even a killer. He can save his friend, the   
   young Amy, but not if he saves the older Amy, the one he failed. Of   
   course he's going to want to save the younger version, and of course   
   he has the ruthlessness needed to ignore the cries of the older   
   version. In these scenes, Matt Smith's impassiveness is downright   
   chilling.   
      
   Amy: The episode provides Karen Gillan an opportunity to show her   
   range. She is very good as the older Amy, transforming everything from   
   her style of line delivery to her body language to show someone who is   
   constantly on guard, for whom paranoia has simply become a way of   
   life. The older Amy's overriding self-interest is off-putting, but it   
   does fit with the episode. This is someone who has been entirely alone   
   save for killer robots for 36 years. Of course her self-preservation   
   instincts and her selfish qualities will be magnified - Her entire   
   world has been herself and keeping herself alive, nothing more! Her   
   love for Rory shines through in both her older and younger variants,   
   though, as she ultimately agrees to help recover the younger Amy. Not   
   for her younger self, who is just a memory to her; not for the Doctor,   
   who she now despises; only for Rory.   
      
   Rory: In Vampires in Venice, Rory's first episode as a companion, he   
   called the Doctor on the danger he posed to those he traveled with.   
   That is echoed here, when he again calls the Doctor on his   
   carelessness, demanding to know why he didn't plan his trip to this   
   planet better. When the Doctor blithely replies that isn't the way he   
   travels, Rory thunders back, "Then I don't want to travel with yoU!"   
   Really, this is as much Rory's episode as Amy's, maybe more. Rory gets   
   put through the wringer here, having to contend with the idea of   
   losing his wife to a stupid accident, then of gaining his wife back as   
   a hardened middle-aged warrior. In the end, the Doctor calls on him to   
   make a choice that just isn't in Rory's nature, and Rory can't quite   
   do it - at least, not without the older Amy's help. After the events   
   of this episode, I can't help but think that Rory's days on the TARDIS   
   are numbered. I don't see how the writers could sidestep his obvious   
   readiness to end these travels, which have become less a dream and   
   more a nightmare for him.   
      
      
   THOUGHTS   
      
   The Girl Who Waited is a good episode that might have been a great   
   one. The story concept is intriguing, and it manages to present a   
   "Doctor-lite" episode in such a way that you barely notice the   
   Doctor's minimized screen time. The regulars are all on top form, and   
   the production is one of the most visually arresting of a season   
   that's been generally outstanding in this regard.   
      
   The visual element deserves particular praise. The white-on-white   
   rooms and corridors, reminiscent of the void from The Mind Robber's   
   first episode, arrested my attention immediately. The garden set is   
   also quite lovely, and you can see how this centre could be a nice   
   place to spend a lot of time - if not for the threat of the well-   
   meaning but deadly robots, of course.   
      
   The first 20 minutes are excellent. The dilemma is established very   
   quickly, and it's both interesting and involving. Amy's "first day" in   
   the centre is a wonderful sequence, as she moves quickly from enjoying   
   the chance to walk around and explore the garden to running and hiding   
   in terror from the robots. The pace slows a bit once Rory encounters   
   the older Amy, but the story remains intriguing and Amy's   
   transformation to a bitter woman is startling, wonderfully acted by   
   Karen Gillan, and convincing in terms of the plot. All of this works,   
   even the younger Amy's plea for the older Amy's help "for Rory's   
   sake."   
      
   What doesn't quite work for me is the ending. This season has shown a   
   regrettable tendency to overdo the sentiment. The Rebel Flesh had its   
   suspense/horror aspects undermined by an overdose of sentiment near   
   the end. Any potential Night Terrors had was smothered by a saccharine   
   ending in which the Doctor made a very bad speech to inspire the   
   little boy's father to go to the rescue. And now this otherwise very   
   good episode stumbles at the end, in my opinion, by falling into the   
   same trap.   
      
   A little sentiment is good. But self-sacrifice is an overused trope in   
   Doctor Who anyway, and older Amy's defining trait is her heightened   
   sense of self-preservation. Imagine an ending in which older Amy   
   continued to bang on the TARDIS door, begging and pleading for her   
   life as first the TARDIS disappeared, then the robots closed in on   
   her. To me, that would have been vastly more effective than having yet   
   another sentimental speech made as older Amy sacrifices herself in a   
   scene that's overdone to the point of unintentional comedy.   
      
   Sentiment is a part of drama, of course, and has a reasonable place in   
   Doctor Who. But I think too many of this year's episodes have gotten   
   the balance wrong, have overegged the sentiment until the results   
   become melodrama. And this episode becomes the biggest offender,   
   simply because the rest of the show is so good, making the one   
   misplayed scene all the more frustrating.   
      
   Still a good episode, mind you, one I wouldn't think of skipping. I   
   just wish it had backed off the saccharine sentiment, just a little   
   bit, at the end.   
      
      
   Rating: 7/10.   
      
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